Mediaset to introduce HbbTV apps in Italy

After successful tests of Italy’s first HbbTV app on the La5 channel, Italian commercial broadcaster Mediaset is ready for the national rollout of several applications.

These include TgCom, Sport Mediaset, Meteo.it apps, or dedicated apps for the broadcaster’s news, sports and weather services.

The novelty is the result of Mediaset’s participation in the Multi-Platform Application Toolkit (MPAT) project for the development of HbbTV (Hybrid Broadcast Broadband TV) software.

The European standard for convergence between broadband and broadcasting technologies has been already adopted in Germany and many European countries, and will soon be available in Italy.

MPAT aims to develop a “modular” and “open-source” platform which can be easily expanded to allow multi-screen applications to interact with TV programmes, on-demand video and OTT content in HbbTV.

In addition to contributing to the development of the MPAT platform, Mediaset cooperates specifically through system trials on an industrial scale. After several trials, the consortium plans to soon introduce the final version.

The 24-month project was launched in December 2015 and is co-funded by the European Commission as part of the Horizon 2000 Programme.

Besides Mediaset, it also involves partners from the media industry and research institutes, such as IRT, RBB, LeadIn, Lancaster University, Fincons Group, Fraunhofer, and Telecom Paris Tech.

MPAT is based on the web-page creation tool WordPress and allows users to easily create HbbTV apps from scratch or pre-built templates. It targets content creators, specifically broadcasters and producers of TV programmes.